Steph Peters Am I the only mom that yells at their children? I feel like it’s a daily thing now that my kids are toddlers. Am I the one being extra cranky? Are my kids just becoming naughty and not listening to me? I just want to enjoy these fun years with my little toddlers instead of being exhausted every day.
It was like Facebook knew what I was thinking as I was scrolling thru and all of a sudden saw a webinar that answered the question as to WHY children are acting like this that make the daily yelling and nagging happen. Plus, they had tips on how to make it stop! I clicked on it and thought I would take any advice I can get and was able to watch a good portion before the kids awoke from nap time. You know the saying, “it takes a village” well that’s why I wanted to share some of the highlights from what I saw and pass them along to you in case you’re going through what I am right now.
I’m passing along in my verbiage and what stood out to me the most.
- They are “acting up” because they will take ANY attention they can get from you. If they know you will show attention when they are hurting each other or doing something naughty, they see that as attention. So make sure you are showing them enough POSITIVE attention and then they won’t have to act up to get your attention in those other ways.
- Give them power. Just like we as adults don’t like being pinned down and told what to do every step of every day, neither do our kids. I try really hard ot make sure my kids get to make their own choices. For example, I give 2 options on what to make for dinner, have them help make that choice of dinner, and sure enough they usually will eat that full dinner because they had the power in making it.
- Finally, making consequences related to the item and making the consequence actually make sense, not be so far fetched. Most importantly, make sure to give them the power with the choice ahead of time by telling them the consequence for the action. This one was a “ah ha” moment for me as I realized I would make a consequence and just spring it on them. For example, “ok you are not finishing your dinner so you don’t get to watch your TV show.” Instead, give them the power and the choice “if you don’t finish your dinner, then you don’t get your dessert tonight.” Then follow through!